Student Organizations

Legal education at New England Law | Boston extends beyond the classroom. Our wide range of student law groups provides many opportunities for students to gain relevant career experience and forge valuable networking ties, while serving the community, making new friends, and having fun.

Student Bar Association

The Student Bar Association is the representative body of the students at New England Law | Boston and is affiliated with the Law Student Division of the American Bar Association. It co-sponsors speakers on legal and professional issues, organizes social activities, and offers opportunities to become active in the New England Law and greater-Boston community. Our law student organizations are key components of our engaged community, and we invite you to learn more about them.

Here’s a list of our legal organizations, law groups, and law student associations:

Alternative Dispute Resolution Organization

The Alternative Dispute Resolution Organization provides opportunities for students to learn skills, such as negotiation, mediation, and arbitration, through student competitions and interaction with the practicing bar. It is dedicated to promoting awareness of alternative dispute resolution, providing information on training and career opportunities, and helping students who plan to practice litigation or transactional law so they better understand alternative dispute resolution.

American Constitution Society

The American Constitution Society for Law and Policy promotes the US Constitution and its fundamental values: individual rights and liberties, genuine equality, access to justice, democracy, and the rule of law. The chapter provides opportunities to engage with speakers and with students and attorneys in other local chapters. Events have included a review of recent US Supreme Court decisions with New England Law professors, mentorship programs, and social events.

American Health Lawyers Association

The American Health Lawyers Association focuses on legal issues in the health care field. The New England Law chapter provides education, speakers, panel discussions, and mentors. The chapter has benefited from the assistance of the American Health Lawyers Association, the Boston Bar Association’s Health Law Group, and the Massachusetts Bar Association’s Health Law Continuing Legal Education classes.

Art and Fashion Law Society

The Art and Fashion Law Society introduces students to the legal aspects of the art and fashion industries, a developing practice area that intersects with intellectual property and business law, and in some cases, environmental, human rights, and Internet law. It provides resources, career development opportunities, and events that focus on legal topics facing creative industries.

Asian Pacific American Law Students Association

The Asian Pacific American Law Students Association promotes cultural diversity and encourages conversation about the law in networking events, community involvement, and work with other organizations, including the Boston Lawyers Group and the Asian American Lawyers Association of Massachusetts. Events include a 1L mentoring program and bowling night, volunteering at the Asian food pantry Rice Sticks & Tea, and the screening Of Civil Rights & Wrongs: The Fred Korematsu Story onKorematsu Day.

Black Law Students Association

The Black Law Students Association promotes social justice and equality for all students, facilitates awareness of issues affecting law students of color, and works to create an inclusive environment for dialogue and interaction among all ethnicities. It hosts events that address issues facing law students of color; develops opportunities to interact with the greater-Boston legal community; promotes diversity and critical awareness on sensitive issues; and collaborates with the Charles Hamilton Houston Enrichment Program, Minority Students Association, and other groups.

Business Law Society

The Business Law Society advances educational and career interests, promotes integrity and accountability for business and nonprofit organizations, and works with the Center for Business Law. Driven by its core values of developing leadership, personifying professionalism, and engaging in community involvement, the group focuses on awareness of business-related legal issues and provides opportunities to develop relationships within the business legal community through events, programs, and networking opportunities.

Criminal Law Society

The Criminal Law Society promotes social justice and equality, fosters relationships between criminal law practitioners and students aspiring to enter the field, and provides opportunities to effect change in the community. Events and activities have included LexisNexis practical-skills training, criminal law, alumni networking events, volunteer opportunities with the Massachusetts Department of Corrections, discussions with local judges and attorneys, and collaborations with fellow student groups.

Due Process

A newspaper written and run by students, Due Process features articles about current happenings in law and entertainment, the law school experience, and lighter subject matter.

Entertainment and Sports Law Organization

The Entertainment and Sports Law Organization supports students’ career aspirations through engaging and educational events and activities. Annual events include a speaker panel with entertainment and sports legal professionals, a student-faculty softball game, and a pub-night fundraiser. The chapter often works with similar groups from other law schools.

Environmental Law Society

The Environmental Law Society promotes discussion and awareness of environmental legal issues through movie nights, the sharing of opinions and ideas, and an annual career panel of environmental and energy attorneys. The society supports a grant program that provides a stipend to a student with an unpaid summer environmental/energy internship. Fundraising includes a vegetarian potluck lunch for students
and faculty, the Go-Green! mixer, and the mid-spring semester bash,
co-hosted with the Animal Defense Fund.

New England Law | Boston Federalist Society

The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies is a national organization of conservatives and libertarians dedicated to reforming the current legal order through debate from all sides of the ideological spectrum and dialogue among opposing political philosophies. This chapter hosts speaker events, often held in collaboration with other student groups. Guests have included academics, reform advocates, Supreme Court litigators, JAGs from several military branches, and grassroots activists.

Federal Bar Association

The Federal Bar Association’s mission is to strengthen the federal legal system and its administration of justice. The New England Law chapter seeks to educate, inform, and provide practical services to the law school community. The organization helps promote federal issues within the judiciary, and highlight these issues through educational talks, judicial roundtables, a lunch-bites series, and gatherings of the Federal Bar Association’s Young Lawyers Division.

Immigration Law Association

The Immigration Law Association provides students with access to up-to-date information, career options, networking events, and community involvement. Partnering with New England Law’s Center for Law and Social Responsibility, the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, and the Greater-Boston Citizenship Initiative, the organization also arranges opportunities for students to intern at Citizenship Clinics.

Intellectual Property Law Association

The Intellectual Property Law Association acts as an intellectual property law information outlet for the New England Law community; enhances educational, cultural, and social opportunities through events and programs; provides students with a better understanding of intellectual property law and the industries surrounding it; and offers a forum to network within the intellectual property law industry.

International Law Society

The International Law Society is dedicated to the advancement of international law. It offers opportunities to learn about other cultures and legal systems, schedules networking and program events, and provides access to its large network of global resources. Chapter events include symposia and career panels. Study abroad programs and international legal internships are available through New England Law’s Center for International Law and Policy.

Italian-American Justinian Law Society

The Italian-American Justinian Law Society is a social, cultural, and educational group that represents students of Italian heritage, as well as those who share an interest in Italian culture and values. The group sponsors speakers, lectures, fundraisers, and social gatherings, and provides a forum for the discussion of issues that are important to the Italian-American legal community. The group also coordinates a mentorship program with attorneys and judges of the Justinian Law Society of Massachusetts.

Jewish Law Students Association

The Jewish Law Students Association is a social, cultural, and educational group that focuses on social and professional networking, and coordinates fun events that fall on Jewish holidays, including the Crash My Sukkah Party and Passover Seders. A speaker series brings in attorneys from the Boston area to network and to educate New England Law students about various areas of the law.

Latin American Law Students Association

The Latin American Law Students Association increases awareness of legal issues relating to Latin American communities through events and meetings; promotes diversity with events for all students; and provides a network for academic support, community outreach opportunities, and career counseling. The association also offers support to help 1L members complete their first year successfully.

Minority Students Association

The Minority Students Association fosters a sense of community, raises awareness of issues concerning multicultural students, and develops opportunities for networking with the Massachusetts legal community. Members may volunteer for the Legal Scholar Mentorship Program that introduces Boston high school students to the law through interactive activities, field trips, and a mock trial. Association activities include a social mixer, a networking event, and a year-end banquet.

OUTLaws

OUTLaws works to educate, unite, and offer opportunities for the LGBTQ community and its allies. It sponsors programs relating to transgender identity awareness; seminars with legal professionals; panel discussions on family law, probate law, and tax and financial services; and events with other student organizations. It also collaborates with the Massachusetts LGBTQ Bar Association for monthly social mixers, a legal professional mentoring program, and volunteer public service opportunities.

Phi Alpha Delta Legal Fraternity

Phi Alpha Delta Law Fraternity, International, seeks to create bonds between students and teachers of the law with members of the bench and bar, and to promote core values for a lifetime of honorable professional and public service. New England Law’s MacLean Chapter holds and co-sponsors events, including Dress for Success (with Brooks Brothers), Fixing Your Mid-Term Mistakes, Alternative Careers with a JD, and a 2L Appellate Brief Help Session (with the Intellectual Property Law Association).

Phi Delta Phi International Legal Fraternity

Phi Delta Phi is an international fraternity that promotes the highest standard of ethics and professionalism in law schools and the legal profession. New England Law’s student group is the Bradlee Inn local chapter of the International Legal Honor Society Phi Delta Phi. It hosts community service activities, such as its annual food drive, and networking opportunities that include career development panels of alumni and other practicing attorneys, followed by mixers.

Public Interest Law Association

The Public Interest Law Association strives to raise awareness of the needs, issues, and employment opportunities for federal and state administrative and regulatory agencies, advocacy groups, legal aid agencies, lobbyist groups, prosecution agencies, and public defenders’ offices. Its auction raises money for a summer grant program for students. Other activities include speaker panels, a networking event, volunteering at local agencies, and fundraisers to benefit Boston organizations.

Real Estate and Land Use Society

The Real Estate and Land Use Society exposes students to real estate and land use legal issues and career tracks. Activities include speaking engagements, educational programs, and networking events. It provides a basic understanding of principles in real estate transactions, such as real estate sales, conveyancing, and mortgage law, and land use, including tools that control the growth and development process, such as subdivision development and zoning law.

South Asian Law Students Association

The mission of the South Asian Law Students Association is to provide a sense of community for students of South Asian descent; a forum to meet and interact with peers, opportunities for students of all ethnic backgrounds to partake in South Asian cultural experiences and social programs, and awareness and understanding of contemporary South Asian issues, both legal and non-legal.

Student Animal Legal Defense Fund

The Student Animal Legal Defense Fund promotes awareness of animal law. Educational events, advocacy, and scholarship are aimed at protecting the lives and advancing the interests of animals through the legal system. Events have included walks and runs for animal protection groups; speakers on careers in animal law and animal advocacy; Go Green!, a mixer and fundraiser (co-hosted with the Environmental Law Society); and a Wellness Week event with therapy dogs.

Women’s Law Caucus

The Women’s Law Caucus promotes social justice and equality for women and men and strives to raise awareness and funds for problems, often described as women’s issues, that affect men, women, and children: domestic violence, breast cancer, same-sex marriage, and AIDS. Events have included a fundraiser during Domestic Violence Awareness Month, a Women in Federal Practice panel with practitioners and judges (co-sponsored with the Federal Bar Association), and a screening of the documentary film, The Case Against 8 (with OUTLaws). The chapter’s Follies event raises money for a stipend for an intern working in the domestic violence field.